Tribunal Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia

Page 42

1 Monday, 26 July 2004

2 [Status Conference]

3 [Open session]

4 [The appellants entered court]

5 --- Upon commencing at 4.18 p.m.

6 JUDGE POCAR: Good afternoon to everybody. Madam Registrar, would

7 you call the case, please.

8 THE REGISTRAR: Good afternoon, Your Honour. This is case number

9 IT-98-34-A, the Prosecutor versus Martinovic and Naletilic.

10 JUDGE POCAR: Thank you.

11 May I now call for appearances. For the Prosecution.

12 MR. FARRELL: Good afternoon, Your Honour. Appearing for the

13 Prosecution is Norman Farrell, Ms. Marie-Ursula Kind, and Ms. Susan

14 Grogan. Thank you.

15 JUDGE POCAR: Thank you.

16 May I turn to the Defence. Mr. Martinovic --

17 MR. HENNESSY: Matt Hennessy here for Mr. Naletilic, along with

18 Chris Meeks.

19 JUDGE POCAR: Thank you. For Mr. Martinovic.

20 MR. PAR: [Interpretation] Good afternoon, Your Honour, I'm Zelimir

21 Par, Defence counsel for Vinko Martinovic.

22 JUDGE POCAR: I don't have the translation, but thank you. I have

23 problems with the translation.

24 THE INTERPRETER: Can you hear now the English channel? Can you

25 hear the English channel?

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1 Can you hear the English booth now? Can you hear the English

2 booth now?

3 JUDGE POCAR: I'm sorry. I hear noise in my earphone.

4 Now can you hear me? Do the interpreters hear me?

5 THE INTERPRETER: Yes, Your Honour.

6 JUDGE POCAR: Okay. Now it's fine.

7 Well, the last Status Conference in this case was held at the end

8 of March, so we almost come to the end of the 120 days which are indicated

9 by the Rules. First let me ask the appellants if they have any problem,

10 any concerns, to raise relating to the appeal, to the detention

11 conditions, and so on.

12 May I ask counsel for Mr. Martinovic.

13 MR. PAR: [Interpretation] Your Honour, we do not have anything to

14 remark in relation to Vinko Martinovic's detention, and we have no special

15 questions to raise today. Thank you.

16 JUDGE POCAR: I thank you.

17 May I ask counsel for Mr. Naletilic.

18 MR. HENNESSY: Yes, Your Honour. As to detention, we have no

19 issues to raise today.

20 JUDGE POCAR: I thank you very much.

21 Then I think we can move to the status of the case. First the

22 question concerning the additional evidence we should deal with. As to

23 the appeal of Mr. Naletilic, there's a motion that has been filed by

24 Mr. Naletilic under Rule 115. A response has come in from the Prosecution

25 and the Chamber will decide in due course on the motion.

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1 As to Mr. Martinovic's appeal, there has been a motion which has

2 been disposed of, a second motion under Rule 115 is pending and will again

3 be decided by the Bench in due course. I got just before coming here

4 another motion which unfortunately I had no time to read because I got it

5 five minutes ago, submitted by the Appellant Naletilic to present

6 additional evidence pursuant to Rule 115.

7 Well, first I would like perhaps to hear from the Prosecution if

8 they were aware of this motion or just they received it today. I have to

9 note that this motion comes very late, and as far as I can see, just

10 having a very quick look at it, no leave is asked by the appellant to

11 submit a motion so late -- I don't have now the figures exactly, but it

12 must be more or less one year after the deadline for submitting bona fide

13 motions in the case. I say more or less because I don't have the exact

14 date in mind now.

15 Well, I don't know whether the Prosecution wants to say something.

16 MR. FARRELL: Thank you, Your Honour. Yes, I noted under the

17 Rules that were in force at the time the notice of appeal was filed, the

18 Rules at that time indicated that there was 75 days. The Rules had

19 been amended at the time of the filing of the notice of appeal in this

20 case, so they were in force since that time.

21 I have had the chance to review the motion, and I have also

22 brought it to the attention of counsel for Mr. Naletilic that it might be

23 advisable that they at least seek leave under the present Rules as the

24 75-day period has passed. And as far as I can read the motion, there

25 wasn't leave sought, so I leave it for my learned colleagues, counsel for

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1 Mr. Naletilic, to indicate whether they intend to seek leave as well.

2 But, yes, I would agree with Your Honour that that is the process.

3 JUDGE POCAR: I thank you.

4 May I turn to counsel for Mr. Naletilic.

5 MR. HENNESSY: Yes, thank you, Your Honour.

6 I wanted to file the motion concerning new evidence prior to the

7 conference today. I was aware of the need to request leave. I needed to

8 confer with my co-counsel and also to get the timing of our acquisition of

9 documents. My notes at home reflected that we received them well after

10 the 75-day cut-off by the Rules in place at the time of the filing of the

11 notice of appeal. With the leave of the Court, I will file a motion for

12 leave to file this motion for additional evidence setting out specifically

13 the dates when we required them, which I now have and which I did not have

14 last week on filing the motion. I simply wanted the Prosecution to have

15 as much notice as possible as to these documents.

16 JUDGE POCAR: Yes, Mr. Hennessy. I understand that you understand

17 that leave has to be sought to submit this motion. I would suggest that

18 you submit a detailed request seeking leave. I see there are several

19 documents here submitted, and they should indicate what are the reasons

20 why this motion comes so late and couldn't come earlier, specifically to

21 the several sets of documents you are submitting. I don't think for -- it

22 is necessary that you re-file the motion. I will consider that just a

23 waste of paper. So just complement the motion by request for leave.

24 MR. HENNESSY: Yes.

25 JUDGE POCAR: I think this is an acceptable procedure.

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1 MR. HENNESSY: Yes. Thank you. And just for the Court's

2 information, all those documents were recovered at the same time and, as I

3 say, recovered after the 75-day cut-off. So I understand the Court's use

4 of the word that they're late; however, our acquisition of these documents

5 was after any former deadline for filing Rule 115 motions. And in that

6 regard we have only within the last two weeks come into possession -- I

7 say "we." Members of the Defence team have come into possession of

8 documents on the order of 1500 pages of documents which I have not

9 reviewed yet, I have not seen yet. But I simply tell the Court about this

10 at this time in anticipation of possibly filing a third motion under

11 Rule 115, that these documents, as I say, are -- we've only had them about

12 two weeks. And additionally, my understanding is we may be receiving

13 additional documents pursuant to the Prosecution's continuing obligation

14 to provide relevant materials here in the near future as well which are

15 separate from the documents we only recently acquired.

16 JUDGE POCAR: That's fine. I only want to draw your attention to

17 the Rules and the fact that to submit motions under Rule 115 with a

18 certain delay like this, you must show good reasons for doing so. So

19 please be as detailed as possible in giving those reasons.

20 Well, this, I think, takes care of the questions concerning the

21 additional evidence in this appeal for the time being. There is one other

22 matter we may briefly consider. That's the question of the protective

23 measures concerning Witness NC. We're in a public meeting, so I would not

24 of course disclose any names. I think we are in a position now to - after

25 the last filing by the Defence of Appellant Naletilic - to make a decision

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1 on that. And therefore, I think that after the recess you will receive a

2 decision on this. I think we have all the elements now to make a decision

3 on this matter unless the parties want to raise anything in this respect.

4 Mr. Meek.

5 MR. MEEK: Your Honour, I think that we've covered it in the

6 various filings. I don't think there's anything else I could add today.

7 JUDGE POCAR: That's fine.

8 Prosecution, I understand, has nothing to add to this.

9 Well, let me ask if there are any other matters that the parties

10 want to raise at this stage in this appeal. Prosecution.

11 MR. FARRELL: If I may, Your Honour. There's no matters pending

12 related to any of the issues before you.

13 I just wanted to raise one thing. I had the opportunity to

14 mention to counsel for Mr. Naletilic, but I haven't had the opportunity to

15 mention to counsel for Mr. Martinovic, that I just thought I'd inform them

16 officially that last week I was informed that there are some new documents

17 that have been placed in the Croatian state archive. I have not had the

18 chance to see them, and they aren't in the possession of the Prosecution.

19 But in light of the fact that I understand there were some additional

20 documents which were not previously in the Croatian state archive, I just

21 want to put the Defence on notice of that in case they feel it necessary

22 to do any further investigations and review the documents. I have been

23 informed that the documents relate to some of the events in Central

24 Bosnia. I don't know whether they relate to the events in Mostar, whether

25 they would even be relevant to this case, but I just thought I'd put you

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1 on notice.

2 Other than that, Your Honour, I have nothing further to add.

3 JUDGE POCAR: Thank you, Mr. Farrell.

4 Does the Defence have anything to say on this?

5 MR. PAR: [Interpretation] This is the very first information that

6 we've received about this, so we would like to express our thanks and we

7 have no comments for the time being. Thank you.

8 JUDGE POCAR: Thank you.

9 Mr. Hennessy.

10 MR. HENNESSY: Yes, Your Honour. The only thing I can imagine

11 perhaps maybe to do in the future is if the Registry resists approving an

12 investigator to review the documents for us since we're not conversant in

13 the language I'm sure the documents are in, then perhaps we'll seek court

14 intervention. But apart from that, no. And I thank the Prosecution for

15 so informing us.

16 JUDGE POCAR: Okay, fine.

17 If there are no other matters, I think we can adjourn. The Status

18 Conference stands adjourned.

19 ---Whereupon the Status Conference

20 adjourned at 4.36 p.m.

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